Addidng additonal media server

[jacksors]

I am currently running NetBackup 6.5.3 on Windows Server 2003 with a seperate master and media server. The Media server is connected to a single tape library/robot with 6 drives that are all fiber attached. I'm looking to add another media but don't have another library.

What do I need to do to allow this new media server to access the current robot and use the tape drives assigned to it? I'm looking for what configuration items I need to do in Netbackup as well as physcially cabling the server. Do I need to attach  the new media server to the SAN and zone the tape drives to it as well as the existing media server?

Currently I only have one Storage unit that has control over all 6 drives. I was thinking about creating another storage unit and spilting the drives, so one would control 4 drives the other 2. I would also create a Storage Unit Group that would contain both storage units and allow some policies the ability to use all 6 drives in the group. Anything special I need to do there to make sure both media servers can use the drives in this way?

How do the clients know which media server to go to? On Windows clients you can configure them and add entires for each media server, but what about VCB backups? Is there a way to make sure certain clients always come through a network interface on a specific media server as well as have some clients be able to come across a network interface on any media server that is not busy or has idle drives?

Thanks.

[alazanowski]

First of all, i always recommend NEVER sharing the drives themselves. While this potentially makes sense, you leave yourself open for contention issues.

Steps involved in doing what you need:
1) Connect the new media server to the SAN. Zone ONLY the tape drives you want it to use.
2) Adjust the zoning on the old media server to ONLY see the tape drives you want it to use.
3) Make sure the two media servers can communicate with each other (host entries or DNS) so that the exchange of information can work. Same with the master and VMD.
4) Create the seperate storage unit groups in the way that the networks are associated. If they all share the same network, its okay to have one storage group holding both. If the two media servers contain VCB proxies each, then create an additional storage unit group for both labeling for what VCB proxy it should be. Adjust the policies accordingly.
5) Make sure that all clients have the additional media server added to them through the gui in access. Make sure that they have a hostname resolution in some manner (whether hosts file or DNS) of that box.
6) You can control certain clients going to certain media servers by having them in seperate policies with the storage unit being directed as intended.


If you would like, i can show you a visio chart that helps put this in perspective.

[jacksors]

A visio would be great.

I guess I kind of miss spoke when I said sharing drives. I guess I should have said sharing the library/robot.  Isn't that what the "Media Server Load balancing" option is used for when creating a Storage Unit Group? If not, what is that option used for?

Say I have 6 tape drives and they are configured in 1 library/robot. I zone 3 drives to media1 and 3 drives to media2. Wouldn't that mean I would have two libraries? Would these drives be required to be in 2 seperate storage units (one for each media server)?

If I were to create two storage units (each with 3 drives) and then add both storage units to a Storage Unit group and assigned that group to a policy, would clients then just get randomly assigned to a media server since the drives in the group span both servers? If I wanted a client/policy to backup to a particular media server, I would just have to specify the associated storage group for that media server correct?

Can you explain your point 4 a little more in depth? What do you mean when you say "Create a seperate storage unit groups in the way that the networks are associated"?

The media server, and new media server will have multiple networks connected. One will be a primary interface on the production network and there will be other interfaces connected to multiple backup networks. I'll have clients that will backup over all interfaces, including the production one. I'll want the clients, regardless of the network interface they are being backed up across to utilize any storage unit I choose. This is how things are currently working for me.

If I were to just designate one of my media servers as a VCB proxy but associate a storage unit group that contained all drives across all media servers with that policy, would the data collected on the VCB proxy media server be able to be written to a tape controlled by the non-VCB proxy media server?

Very good feedback, really appreciate it. Please provide the visio. Let me know if you need my email. Thanks again.

[CY]

Q: Say I have 6 tape drives and they are configured in 1 library/robot. I zone 3 drives to media1 and 3 drives to media2. Wouldn't that mean I would have two libraries?

A: You still have only 1 library/robot defined in NBU, even if you zone 3 drives to one media server and the other 3 drives to another media servers. The reason is you only have one robotic control, which can be assigned to only one media server.

(Note some tape libraries allow you to buy license to partition the library into several logical robots - that would give you more than 1 robotic control. But I don't think you are talking about this case)

Q: Would these drives be required to be in 2 separate storage units (one for each media server)?

A: Yes, because you have drives assigned to 2 media servers, so you have to make 2 storage units:
Storage_unit_1 = (media_server_1) 3 tape drives
Storage_unit_2 = (media_server_2) 3 tape drives

Q: f I were to create two storage units (each with 3 drives) and then add both storage units to a Storage Unit group and assigned that group to a policy, would clients then just get randomly assigned to a media server since the drives in the group span both servers?

A: Not necessarily "randomly assigned" - it depends on how you configure the Storage Unit Group - NBU gives you 4 selections: Prioritized (choose the 1st STU in the list that is not busy), Failover (choose the 1st STU in the list that is not down), Round Robin (choose the least recently selected), and Load Balance.

Q: If I wanted a client/policy to backup to a particular media server, I would just have to specify the associated storage group for that media server correct?

A: You can assign the policy to a specific storage unit, not "storage unit group", so the backup would go to the specific media server only.

Q: If I were to just designate one of my media servers as a VCB proxy but associate a storage unit group that contained all drives across all media servers with that policy, would the data collected on the VCB proxy media server be able to be written to a tape controlled by the non-VCB proxy media server?

A: Since this VCB Proxy is also a media server, there is no reason to run the VCB backup outside of this media server. Just configure a separate backup policy to use this media server's STU (For example, Storage_uni_1 as above) and to include only this media server (which is also the VCB Proxy) in the Clients list.

In other words, your backup data would be from SAN (ESX LUNs presented to VCB proxy) to SAN (tape drives assigned to media server).  No need to run backup cross LAN again - that's the beauty of offhost backup.  :)

[Raghuraam]

For all kinds of clarification please refer

http://seer.entsupport.symantec.com/docs/290282.htm

Raghuraam

[jacksors]

Wow! Excellent feedback, thank you.

For the VCB proxy part, If I understand this correctly, I would need to make both of my media server's VCB proxies if I wanted to leverage all 6 drives for use with backing up VM's correct? And then devide my VMWare backups across both media servers?

If Media_Server_1 is a VCB proxy and is attached to Storage_Unit_1, the VCB backups would not be able to write to the drives in Storage_Unit_2 on Media_Server_2 because then they would have to go across the LAN to reach that server. Am I correct on that?

What if I were to introduce two new media servers and decommision the original media server? How would I move the existing robot to now be controlled by one of the two new media servers?

I'm using Vault and its tied to the robot and I am concerned I'm going to mess up all the information kept in Vault and not have an accurate picture of all of my off-site media and am not sure how I could re-import that information if I were to remove the robot from media_server_1 and remove media_server_1 from NetBackup and assign it to a new media_server_2 or new media_server_3.

Thanks again for the feedback. This is very good stuff.